The New Modern - Recording an album during COVID-19 with X-Ray Love

In conversation with rock band X-Ray Love on how they recorded an album during COVID-19.

How did you all meet and how was the band formed?
Rick: Ella and I knew each other from Toronto and had briefly played in a band that was just starting before she moved to NYC. And Niall and Barry are cousins they had played together as kids back in the day.
Ella: Band formed Through some luck and good timing. Me and Rick had just begun working on some new songs I wrote after he moved her from our home town Toronto Canada, I had been in New York for about a year checking out all the venues and working on new material.
Rick: I got thirsty and went to the vending machine for a Gatorade and there was this handwritten sign looking for a singer and drummer. The list of influences was all good stuff. We loved that it was handwritten and not typed. 
Ella: It had a good vibe. A few days later we gave the no. A call and there was Niall, we had a good chat, I loved his Irish Accent. We lined up a jam and that's when We all met. Coz Niall and Barry, the Irish cousins were a set. And it just all fit.

1. What one aspect of recorded music will see the longest-lasting repercussions of the global health pandemic?
Ella: I think it is too early to tell. Six months doesn't make anyone a great sound engineer. Even a year would not make us engineers anyway.

2. What were the three largest obstacles in recording a new album with your band?
Rick: Drums, it is hard to capture the right sound. 
Ella: Remote mixing and Mastering, would have loved to be in the room esp. for mixing.
Barry: All the back and forth of sharing the mix electronically, having adjustments made, then another listen and we were in lockdown so what headphones are you using, versus the engineers, what are you hearing versus what Niall for instance is hearing on his headphones.
Niall: my headphones were a mess too
Rick: The back and forth, ideally you would sit in a room w your band mates and a good pair of speakers and talk it out. But we could not do that because of COVID-19.

3. What's been your strategy as to how the band has posted on social media hyping up the new album?Ella: We waited longer than we would have before Covid to hype it, the timing was off with the Black Lives Movement and where people’s heads are at in these strange and challenging times.  We are unable to gig in New York still with the restrictions so sharing the progress on the EP has provided us with new content Instead of say sharing pics of Barry doing Bass repair jobs at home. Which was a good story too for the record. We are launching some fun contests day that it goes live and some ads will run. But the 30-day builder just seems tone deaf right now.

4. How has your band adapted to the new world?
Ella: Is there a new world? I guess have we adapted to the COVID climate?
Niall: We adapted pretty good, people still want to see us, our gigs keep getting rescheduled, we made this recording and we are still working on our music.
Rick: We have this space to jam in.
Barry: That's true, we have been doing great with that since we got this space
Ella: Yea that was a long 3 months when we couldn't get together.

5. Will this pandemic see the rise of self-recorded music, or will remote recordings through professional/established studios be more popular?
Ella: I think professional recordings will be missed with the volume of home recordings we will see.
Barry: Many people were already making home recordings, it’s been going on so long that every platform gets so saturated that a new one comes along and while its good it also makes it hard to find what you want or what you are really looking for.

6. Many smaller companies double as their own marketing/advertising company. In addition to what you had already done for self-promotion, what other skills have you had to learn during this adapting phase?Rick: We didn’t really have to learn to do anything we would not have had to learn to do anyway as an indie band.
Ella: True, as a new band it is all new to us. We had only been together for what 5 months? Before the big shutdown, we were just getting started on everything. In a way the current situation levels the field as even established acts have had to rethink anything that was tried and tested.

7. How have you specifically been impacted by this?
Barry: I can’t go home to Ireland. We had to cancel a trip. I was also off work for a while.
Niall: Can't travel and not working for a while was hard.
Barry: Not being able to go out.
Ella: Having all your gigs cancelled, having everything you were looking forward to cancelled. Friends being sick, financially ruined, having to leave the city. Taking pay cuts and being one of the lucky that still works. it blows my mind that more people are unemployed now in the USA than There are people in Canada.

8. How has the individual practices progressed through the pandemic?
Niall: When we could not jam, I was playing with backing tracks and I played quite a lot of guitar
Rick: It was hard for me as the drummer, I mostly hunted around for a private space so I could get to a kit
Ella: I played more scales than I have in a long while and I wrote a bunch of new songs that we are beginning to work on now as a band.
Barry: I repaired my favourite bass .

9. Have you noticed an influx of new musical business ideas/models during the pandemic?
Ella: Not so much yet, lots of acoustic renditions. Lots of live videos and video concerts. It is hard for a loud band because the sound quality on a phone via Instagram etc. is just not ideal.
I think it is still in the brewing phase, too early to know what comes and it depends on how long we have to live this way.

10. With the huge influx of virtual "everythings" (music/teaching/meetings/etc.) how will you keep and grow your digital audience?
Everyone is shouting into the same void; I was a social media virgin before this but rather than being concerned with a certain no. Of Followers I am more concerned with personal contact, 1-2-1 engagement and producing new content.

11. What's helped keep you grounded from a personal standpoint?
Niall: No one ever grounded me.
Rick: My Step mom grounded me when I was in grade 3.
(Ella explains what this question means.) 
Barry: Cigarettes, alcohol, and fishing
Rick: I don't know that I was grounded
Ella: Believing that it would end, rock N' roll, Art, and red wine

12. What positives can come out of this for the recorded music industry?
Ella: I do think it is too early to tell, but it seems like a lot of unplugged and paired down versions of songs are being made.

13. Can this be the end of physical recording locations with the rise in popularity of virtual recordings?
Entire band: No, people are going to want to work with experts in person as soon as possible. Access to better equipment for one. 
Ella: Once things go virtual there are things that are lost in translation. 

14. With many of us having been at home for the past few months, many of us have learned/enhanced our digital skills. Will there be an influx of tech-savvy musicians in the new world?  
Barry: We already were in that world. Some people are more tech savvy than others. I can barely figure out my bass amp, laughs. knobs go to center.
Ella: The longer this goes on the more you will learn what you need to survive. 
Niall: It also depends on the type of music people make. As new equipment comes along new people will get the hang of it. 

Check out their new album by click here.